This invention relates to engine maintenance equipment; and more particularly, to a system for a multiple diesel engine power plant in which used oil from the engines is blended with diesel fuel and the blend is used as fuel for the engines.
Changing crankcase oil in the engines of marine vessels where there is very little free space around the engines has always been a difficult problem in the absence of specialized service personnel. Electric motor driven pumps have been used in the past to pump drained oil to storage containers for subsequent disposal. There has not been available, however, a simple remotely controlled system to drain and refill oil from multiple marine engines, except for those disclosed and claimed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,240,523 and in my copending patent application Ser. No. 07/862,724 filed Apr. 3, 1992now U.S. Pat. No. 5,203,429. Both of these systems include a container to receive and contain used oil drained from the engines until the vessel reaches land and can find a disposal site for the used oil.
It is an object of this invention to provide a system for blending used oil from marine diesel engines with diesel fuel and using that blend as fuel for the engines. It is another object of this invention to provide a system for making such a blend periodically, consuming the blend as fuel, and adding fresh oil to the engines and the generator. Still other objects will become apparent from the more detailed description which follows.